Commonly, people involved in outdoor activities wish to rest from their activity or, in the case of hunters, need to wait for game to arrive at the hunting ground. Often, it is difficult or impossible to sit on the ground because of, for example, rocky terrain, mud, or thick underbrush. For these reasons, it is desirable to sit in a position not on the ground. However, it is uncomfortable to sit in a tree and too time consuming to construct a tree stand, assuming one would have the necessary equipment available.
One solution has been to provide a portable seat which can be attached to a tree to allow a person to sit using the tree as a support. For example, backpacks have been developed which are convertible in some manner into a seat. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,730,294 to Thurmond, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,148,376 to Campbell, Jr. However, hikers and hunters do not always wish to carry a bulky backpack for short hikes and day trips. Also, it is difficult to carry other items, such as a rifle, when carrying a backpack.
Another solution has been to provide a smaller seat which can be carried on the back or waist. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,928,793 to Westimayer et al. describes a seat which is worn about the waist. The seat includes a rigid frame which is covered with a covering made of heavy canvass or duck material. However, this arrangement is undesirable because noise is created removing the covering from the frame and it is not desirable, when outdoors, to leave the covering on the frame for long periods of time because the covering may be damaged. Further, the storage area defined by the covering can not be easily accessed by a person sitting on the seat.
Other devices have been proposed but those devices require some type of assembly before they can be used or they incorporate some type of metal chain which may generate noise. See, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,368,725; 4,022,292; and 5,381,941.
For these reasons, a need has developed in the art for a compact portable seat which includes additional storage space. A need also exists for a portable storage enclosure which can be used as a seat.